Russian strikes in Syria blamed for scores of civilian deaths

BEIRUT — Russian air raids killed dozens of people in northwestern Syria on Sunday, activists and residents said, two days after the adoption of a U.N. Security Council resolution backing a peace process to end the country’s devastating civil war.

The incident coincides with a report released Sunday by Human Rights Watch that accuses Russia and the Syrian government of using cluster bombs — indiscriminate scattershot munitions — that have killed dozens of civilians in Syria in recent weeks.

As many as nine airstrikes struck the rebel-held city of Idlib on Sunday morning, killing at least 36 civilians and insurgents, said Rami Abdurrahman, who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The warplanes hit a courthouse and an intelligence building used by opposition groups in the area, said Abdurrahman, whose monitoring group relies on activists inside Syria.

Russia, an important ally of Syrian President Bashar alAssad, has been carrying out airstrikes in Syria against opposition groups since late September.

“The courthouse was full of civilians,” Abdurrahman said. “The Russians have been hitting everything, killing civilians and striking whatever they want.”

The attacks could complicate perhaps the most serious diplomatic process to date for ending the Syrian conflict, which has killed more than 250,000 people, displaced millions and empowered extremist groups such as the Islamic State.

In a rare show of unity Friday, the Security Council unanimously approved a resolution endorsing peace talks between Syria’s government and Assad’s opposition.

Initiated in Vienna in October, that process has received backing from opponents of Assad, including the United States, and his primary allies, Russia and Iran. It calls for drafting a new constitution and for holding elections within 18 months, but it does not address the still-thorny issue of what to do with Assad during the transition process.

In video footage purporting to show the aftermath of the suspected Russian air raids, bloodsoaked bodies lie crushed under layers of concrete and rebar.

A media activist, speaking in English, is shown in one video at the apparent scene of Sunday’s attacks saying that the target “was a courthouse and not a military installation.”

That video shows women wearing bloodied headscarves and older men covered in dust. It then transitions to an apparent civil defense worker who is holding a baby that he says was killed in the attack.

Speaking to the Reuters news agency, Yasser Hammo, a civil defense worker in Idlib, said at least 43 people were killed in the attacks Sunday.